Why Restaurant Design Has Us All Feeling Like Sitting Ducks

Dear restaurant designers,

Fancy seeing you here.

Look, I’m not one for ambushing people, but after a stroll around some of the most stylish settings during Milan Design Week, I’ve got to say this: we need to talk about seating.

Somewhere along the way, amidst all your sleek mock-ups and mood boards, a few basics about how humans actually like to sit when they eat seem to have flown out the window.

Consider this kindly meant feedback before we all need chiropractors on speed dial. Pull up a chair (preferably a comfy one), and take notes.

The Banquette Problem

Banquettes look amazing on your design renders. Everyone’s hugged up close, clinking margarita glasses with stupidly perfect grins. It’s got a retro magic to it that screams “cooler than cool.”

Here’s the reality check, though. Someone always gets stuck in the middle. You know the seat. The no-man’s-land wedged between two people whispering over your head, which turns into a bladder endurance test the moment you sit down. Unless you fancy becoming a contortionist just to slide out mid-dinner, that middle seat locks you in for the night. No loo breaks. Ever.

Nobody wants their evening meal to feel like intermission at Oppenheimer.

The Two-Tier Travesty

Here’s a real head-scratcher I’ve seen cropping up in restaurants. Two people book a table. Seems simple enough, right? But one gets a divine, cushion-soft sofa seat that sinks under them in a comforting hug, while the other... is handed the equivalent of a courtroom chair.

All of a sudden, you’re a postcard titled “Twins,” featuring Danny DeVito and Arnold Schwarzenegger. And listen, as someone who naturally leans more DeVito than Arnie, I’m not pulling up to that couch where I’ll look like a little kid peering over the tabletop. It’s not me.

When the chin’s resting on the cutlery rather than the conversation, you’ve got a design flaw, my friends. Fix it.

Low-Seating Limbo

I’ll give you some slack here. Low seating can work. Key word being can. Outdoors, on balmy summer evenings, sharing olives while your toes dig into sand? Gorgeous. I’m with you all the way.

But indoors? With a menu that includes roast chicken or a mountain of saucy spaghetti? Mate, no one signed up for gynaecological yoga positions at lunchtime. There’s something deeply wrong with trying to carve a bird or slurp ramen while sitting like you’re auditioning for Cirque du Soleil. Never again.

The Bar Stool Blunder

Bar stools belong where the name suggests. At. The. Bar. Stick me on a stool to watch a professional shake the perfect Negroni, and I’m a happy customer. However, food service should rethink the whole “bar stool at the dining table” situation.

You’re asking people to balance three courses while perched somewhere that screams core workout. By the end of the meal, I’ve worked harder than your sous chef. My hips are aching, my posture’s shot, and frankly I’m fantasising about reclining like royalty in a proper chair. This is fine dining, not Ryanair. Treat us with care.

The Too-Wide Table Trap

Restaurant tables should bring people together—not send them yelling across a no-man’s land of glassware and over-ambitious florals. Circular tables? The lovely Chinese restaurants have been nailing those for centuries. Rectangles the size of a cricket pitch? Not so much.

If I can’t lean forward without risking a shoulder dislocation, it feels less like dinner and more like a reunion scene from The Lord of the Rings. If knights in shining armour start pulling up, I’ll know who to blame.

Bottom Line

I get it. Designers want to wow us with spaces that dazzle Instagram feeds and magazine spreads. But here’s the thing no one seems willing to say out loud: all the aesthetics in the world won’t fix a chair that makes us regret sitting down in the first place. Beauty is nothing if the butt’s not happy.

So, restaurant designers, do us diners a solid and toss human comfort back into your design brief. If you see a short bloke struggling to clamber off a too-low sofa, chipmunk cheeks puffed out in frustration, do me a favour. Send a drinks menu - but make sure the server’s bringing an actual chair with it.

John (Nick) Atkinson, The CreActivist Marketer who is Doing it Differently

An extract from my media article on the Milan Design Week 2025